Warning! My blogs might shock you

I find the words to say

My blog may not necessarily be my undoing, but it is a journal and compendium of snippets and snatches of memory, experience, and observation that if I could commit myself to the rigour of an autobiography, there is little else I might need to put in a book apart from flesh out some stories for content, context, and contemplation.

In the versatility of the use of language is the revelation of much that might elicit inquiry and confirmation, yet, what is read should be taken at face value, for there is neither obfuscation nor dissembling, just some finesse, and if one could rise to that standard, the sophistication to make the usually unspeakable readily palatable.

Too many assumptions exist that in the spectrum of believing the worst to fairy tale bliss, the truth is not so much a search for a needle in the haystack, it is in plain sight once disbelief is suspended for accepting an unconsidered reality. It is quite likely a variation on the art of storytelling.

Did you really not know?

There are discussions and difficult ones they are that have made a showing on my blog before they have become a conversation with certain close ones. Too many things to learn about me that it is surprising that the profile texts of my blog and Facebook do not seem to have had the in-depth reading and comprehension desired.

On my blog, I have a play on the meaning of my name Akin in English and any other translation or interpretation you might consider. “Essentially similar to what is known, compatible to what is expected and related to the unexpected…” It would be supercilious to consider myself enigmatic, but the ellipsis at the end is both deliberate and suggestive of much more about me that is unknown.

The Facebook profile changed some time ago because acquaintances from long ago had impressions about me in need of addressing forthwith. Adopting a broad statement was supposed to stem the tide of inquiry, even as I pruned my following to contain aggression and disapprobation. I could not be clearer than this: “I thought and concluded, do not presume you know me, this is really not a biography, it is guidance.”

Shock is the wrong reflex

Then comes the other conundrum, I write quite openly about very personal stuff that gets read by an audience beyond those I am directly in contact with. Even amongst those I know, I do not know who cares to read my blog, though the statistics suggest I have a readership in as far-flung places as Indonesia in the last week, that country taking the lead with the UK, the Netherlands, and Nigeria where I have lived coming 5^th, 7^th, and 9^th respectively. I cannot begin to fathom why the interest from these places, but something is engaging them.

This is my advice to those who read my blog; you will probably learn more than you expected to see, if you have any doubt you might want to give it the benefit of the doubt that what you have read needs no further explanation than what it has said at your first reading. Mental gymnastics are a cause for unnecessary angst, we can agree, your writer does not mince words.

The thought sometimes crosses my mind to be reserved, reticent, or dabble in a form of self-censorship, but rather than curtail, I usually prevail by finding a form of words for whatever I want to express. Finally, I ask for some open-mindedness and the need not to make a shock your first resort in the acquisition of knowledge; the world is a big place, some things might extend your worldview to places you never thought possible. That is the biggest teaching about our humanity.

Shock and Awe

Introduction to Humility - 101

Our friends the Americans are the sole global superpower. Mikhail Gorbachev with his Glasnost and Perestroika policies which opened up the Soviet Union, laid bare an unsustainable drive to compete with America after the Star Wars initiative and put paid to the Cold War.

This brought the liberation of the Eastern Bloc European countries west of the Soviet Union from Communism. Eight of those countries would join the enlarged European Union in May 2004.

The braggadocio that accompanied the invasion of Iraq, the ousting of the Iraqi regime, the end to hostilities and the capture of Saddam Hussein are too well documented to suffer the pillory of revisionist historians.

The Americans and the coalition of the blackmailed, bribed and coerced did a quick job of it all, the shock of a quick victory and the awe of the volume of precision guided artillery that had a target of hitting defenceless civilians is all too well known.

A catalogue still remains of how the American's unilateralist approach with Britain's unstinting support has continually alienated well meaning though differing views to the stance American has adopted.

With hindsight, the war with Iraq was probably necessary, but good technology does not take the place of diplomacy, useful intelligence, respect for the traditions of the occupied territory and the restoration of self-determination for the Iraqi.

One's shock and awe.

• The people of Iraq pronounce it as ee-rack; the occupying forces of America call it eye-rack - you cannot invade, occupy, run roughshod over the country and then rename it.
• The liberation of Jessica Lynch is a lot less to it than meets the eye. You can only put so much of a spin on it before the truth is out.
• There is still no evidence of WMDs or where they might have been disposed of. From weapons deployable within 45 minutes through massive nuclear acquisition to weapons programs. Intelligence suddenly sounds like the ability to see the truth but accentuate a preferred lie.
• Dr David Kelly being spun out of earthly orbit by the New Labour publicity machinery - The Hutton Inquiryprovided a Window on Media
• That a CIA operative was uncovered by some White House apparatchik in revenge for her husband's insistence that Iraq had not acquired uranium from Niger.
• A third person was buried with Saddam's sons, his 14-year-old grandson, Mustafa.
• Ahmed Chalabi who is a convicted felon in neighbouring Jordan is the darling of the American occupying forces - here we go again.
• Death of Sergio de Mello
• Guantanamo Bay - we do not even have a jury to go out on this one - even Cuba is not pleased.
• Contracts going to coalition countries, then they have the gall to ask France, Germany and Russia to forgive Iraqi debts. Dick Cheney's former firm allegedly overcharges by $60 million. One does not understand this, why would I give up $40bn to fight over $18bn?
• No end to hostilities.
• Saddam Hussein found in a hole and Osama bin Laden still at large.

One only hopes that lessons are being learnt, one might have been shocked and awed, but definitely, neither amused nor impressed.

Might tempered with gentle consideration is a difficult but necessary mix or the absence of humility would humble the mighty to the point of humiliation.

Further Reading and references

eye-rack or ee-rock

A small note on pronunciation

Attacking the Shadow through Iraq

Saving Private Jessica Lynch

Shameful Propaganda exposing CIA Spy

Profile: Joe Wilson - Spy's spouse

The last moments of Saddam's grandson

Ahmed Chalabi

Cuba decries detainees' treatment

Sergio Vieira de Mello

EU may fight Iraq contracts ban

Halliburton charge not deliberate

James Baker III seeks reconstruction support

American Casualities